Rose Moxham

Book opens with Nick (who has gone fruit picking with his best mate Robbie) crashing his bike in the middle of the night in a country town after his girlfriend leaves him. The accident is a bad one as Nick must spend the next 6 weeks in traction - unable to feed himself or move. The book alternates chapters between Nick's time in hospital and all the characters around him - his nurse, his fellow patients and the "visitors" from the psych ward - and flashbacks of how he ended up in the situation. His love for Jude, the local singing star who hides a tragic past of a mother who developed Huntington's disease and then threw herself out of Jude's car while she was driving and killed herself. Robbie and Nick also have a fight over Jude as Robbie sees himself as her big brother and believes Nick will leave her and hurt her. Then there is Jude herself who believes that as she carries the possibility of developing the disease herself - there is no point in having a relationship. Meanwhile Nick is given a long time to think through these problems and receives a lot of sage advice from the people he meets in hospital.
Quite sad, thought provoking book.… (mais)